All the Dust that Falls

Chapter 281: Extreme Makeover: City Edition

When Beatrice had declared that the city was Void's, she'd expected a lot of changes. This wasn't one of them.

Later, on the same day they took the city, she groaned, stretching in her chair as the latest petitioner left. It was a relatively nice one that had been taken from elsewhere in the castle to set below the throne.

She used her brief break to glance around the space. Most of the damage had already been repaired thanks to her master's intervention. However, there was still a conspicuous lack of decorations from before. Those would apparently take a bit more effort to replace.

As the next petitioner was ushered in, Bee straightened her back and prepared herself. Hopefully, there wouldn't be too many more today.

"You simply must do something about these cultists!" One well-dressed merchant declared, even as she approached the base of the dais where Bee sat. Bee raised an eyebrow but didn't say anything.

"Why, they're disturbing all my customers with their yelling about how the Lord Void has come. Pure nonsense, I say."

Bee raised her other eyebrow then. Someone didn't know about Void. Many people didn't, but everyone able to secure an audience with her was normally better informed.

When she had declared the city under Void's care, she had hoped that they could organize some giant ceremony where her master could claim its rightful place as god or ruler of the city. But no. Instead, it had chirped excitedly and then zipped off to gods knew where. She had seen reports of Void working its way through the streets, cleaning and repairing everything in sight. Worse, it had yet to return to the palace at all.

Void had completely skipped the palace, as in her master's own words. "It was in the best condition of the city so far."

This had left her with many problems. She never truly expected Void to take an active role in the administration of the city, but having to somehow establish her own authority while also dealing with issues right away was proving difficult. The other issue was the cultists, as this lady had so gently put it. That they were more convinced than ever that they were right and everyone else was wrong.

Her soldiers also stood firm in their own beliefs, but that was different. They weren't going around and causing problems the same way. Besides, they had already gotten used to Void's antics. Her master's obsession with cleaning was a value shared by both groups, and even the parts of the city where Void had yet to reach were scrubbed as spotlessly as the humans could manage. It allowed Void to make the passes even faster.

Unfortunately, the populace wasn't exactly happy about this. Mostly because their homes were regularly broken into in order to sweep the floors. It was a headache and a half to try to get both her soldiers and the cultists to acknowledge the fact that personal property was a thing and they didn't have the right to break in without just cause. And no, seeing dust on the windowsill was not just cause.

Even Void didn't do that. When Void wanted in, you could find the god knocking on someone's door and politely asking. Of course, when her master asked, it emanated an aura so powerful that several people simply passed out on sight, which Void took as a tacit agreement to enter. Or they babbled incoherent acceptance of whatever the powerful divine being that appeared on their doorstep wanted.

The same was not the case for just any level 15 Street Sweeper who had happened to join the cult. They oftentimes caused more of a mess trying to get into someone's house to clean it than they actually fixed. But that didn't change this woman's demands.

They had been working to restore order, and for the most part, they had stopped the break-ins and prevented any looting that unaffiliated parties had tried. But scaring customers away? Well, the city had just been taken. She should be lucky that she had any customers. The woman tapped her foot impatiently as Bee watched her.

"Well?" The woman demanded.

"Well, what?" Bee responded in a soft voice, doing her best to imitate Arthur's calm demeanor and steadfast competence that he radiated. She wasn't sure it was working very well. She was still a growing teenager, so she didn't have the same height to lord over people. Also, she refused to sit on the throne as that was Void's.

"Well, what are you going to do about it?"

Bee held her breath and counted down from five. "The city is being pacified. Any looting should be reported to the nearest outpost of city guards or the nearest army officer."

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Bee said the first half of her normal spiel. They really needed to think of a name for their army. 'The army' didn't really sit very well. They could call it Void's Faithful, but again. It was too culty. She would have a few ideas to run by Void next time her master returned.

"As for customers, the city is still in a bit of disarray for the moment. We'd encourage everyone to stay inside and comply with any authority until things have settled. If you have customers, please inform them to return to their homes and come back tomorrow or another day." Bee said. How had this woman made it past all of her screenings before she had to talk to her? She didn't know, but if this was really how she wanted to act, she would get nothing more than a boilerplate response.

The woman turned on her heel and stormed out. Good riddance, Bee thought. Her next visitor was a far more welcome sight.

Aunt Beatrix bustled into the throne room and hiked up her skirts as she power-walked over to Beatrice, pulled her up by the scruff of her shirt, and swallowed her in a massive hug.

"Oh, I'm so glad you're okay. When I couldn't find you after all the scary fighting had gone down, I wasn't sure what had happened. How did you get a position in the city? What happened?"

Bee managed to pull her head back enough to gasp for air and return her aunt's bone-crushing hug. "Uh, um there's a few things I need to fill you in on. A lot of stuff has happened since I left home, and, well..."

Bee waved her hand overhead, and a place servant came running out with a chair.

"Please sit." She directed her aunt to sit in a seat facing her. "It's a long story."

---

I had never owned a city before. This was so exciting. I was going to take the best care of it ever!

Before Beatrice had a chance to say anything else, I chirped happily and blasted off to start cleaning. There was no time to waste. I was sure that she, Arthur, Susan, and everyone else would do a good job of making sure the city was finally cleansed of the demonic invaders and all the people were taken care of. The last one, in particular, wasn't something I would be very good at anyway.

But you know what? I was good at cleaning, and this city sure needed cleaning. Now that I owned it, I had full rights to make any changes I needed. I would probably leave all the buildings in the same spot, but the roads, well, the roads might be entirely replaced.

The walls would be scrubbed and shined. I might adjust some of them slightly. To make things easier, I would add gutters and a sewer system, and I categorized and ranked the improvements as quickly as they appeared in my processors. This was going to be amazing.

However, it wasn't long until I had to slow my roll a little bit. When I first got to the city, I found an issue: people were in the way everywhere.

But it was okay. That was their job. People lived in the places I cleaned, and they caused the messes I cleaned. That was okay. As long as they didn't go about it maliciously. So, I started working my way through the major streets, cleaning up all trash, refuse, and dirt and polishing the blocks as I went. I considered pouring my sealant over every single bit of the city, but that might make any sort of future changes difficult not just for me but for the people, too. Actually, it may well be impossible without my help.

And as much as I liked the idea of owning a city, I didn't want to spend all my time here. Eventually, people would have to take care of it themselves and pave their own roads when necessary.

So, for the most part, I just cleaned, fixed, and repaired everywhere I went. I melted stones together to form some black glass-like substance and used that to fill in any cracks or bind broken stuff together. It wouldn't take the best load, so I was careful not to put anything I fixed this way in places where a wagon wheel would crush it. But for walking paths, the black glass was quite nice. Especially when I textured it.

I started in the dirtiest parts of the cities and moved outwards. Most people were nice enough to let me into their house to give it a quick once over, but a few people didn't respond. I'd come back and check later, making a mental map of the houses that still needed to be cleaned.

I didn't upgrade everything in the houses. That was a human's job for the most part. However, I would be more than willing to assist if asked. I expected that I'd struggle to deal with the number of requests, though. Perhaps if we could figure out how to make more of my kind That would be nice.

I even recruited several of the nice white-robed people who kept collapsing in front of me to help clear people out of the way. It allowed me to work faster, and they were very, very efficient with it. In fact, I was a little bit concerned about how aggressive they were being. Still, after a few admonishments, they performed their tasks much more acceptably.

This was going to take me several days to finish, but by the time I was done, the city would be a shining beacon for all cleanliness and order. Anyone who came through the streets would be well aware of the value of cleanliness, of what it meant to live their best life.

Once I finished a quick once over, my first pass would be to create a gutter system to funnel all rainwater, collect liquids, and process any waste that fell through it. And then, I would tunnel through the city so that sewage would be carried away acceptably.

I'd have to create some running water for that to really work, but that was secondary. And then I'd also have to connect it up to everyone's house. Hmm. Putting pipes through the walls of some of these second stories might be a little difficult, but... Well, I would cross that bridge when I came to it. For now, though, I just had to clean.

Only occasionally did demons get in my way, but those were quickly removed. Oftentimes, our army was extremely helpful with that.

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